Aga Khan Medical Center Booni�a window of standard health facilities

There was a time when the people of Tehsil Mastuj were quite unaware as to what standard health facilities were like. It was partially so because there were hardly trained health professionals and in part because modern health facilities were almost non-existent. Given such a scenario, many people fall victim to diseases, which would have otherwise been cured, had there been earlier diagnoses.

However it is a matter of satisfaction for the people of Upper Chitral that such a yawning gape in the field of healthcare was filled by Aga Khan Medical Center in village Booni, which has helped overcome many health problems because of early diagnoses and prompt curative measures. Here is a case in point. My son felt acute appendix-related pain in the month of December. He ran the risk of getting it burst, which would have filled his intestine with poison. It was difficult to take him to hospital for it was a snowy weekend and the medical staff were not present in hospitals. Snow avalanches had slapped potential blockades on the road leading to Booni. Transportation had come to a standstill. I had to carry my son all the way to the hospital from Charun to Booni. When I reached Junali Koch�a village 4 kilometers from Charun�I desperately knocked at the door of Dr Abdul Karim, the head of Aga Khan Medical Center Booni, and shared with him the problem. He not only consented to go with us to operate on the appendix of the patient but also helped carrying him to the medical center.

It was a display of high degree professionalism, voluntarism and humanitarianism by any account, which must be a role model for other medical professionals. Through the sincere efforts of the said doctor, new life was delivered to my son, who would have succumbed to the agonizing pain of the appendix and the related complexities otherwise. For all this, I am grateful to God Almighty for He bestowed us with capacious, committed and sincere medical professionals. I am so grateful to Dr Karim for all the kindness and support in such a critical juncture of my life.

Abdur Rehman,
Father of a young patient,
Charun, Upper Chitral